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Japanese starter pack

SO you’ve finally said okay, I want to learn Japanese. If you’ve never learned a language before then it can seem daunting but it’s a very rewarding experience! I’m gonna lay out what helped me start and stuff that I think would’ve been helpful for me even early on! But I still recommend doing your own research and trying lots of different methods bc language learning especially by yourself is a very personal experience! This is also meant for absolute beginners just looking to get started so I will try to keep it simple. 

First I just want to say I think your first goal should be “I want to be able to read and write kana fluently” because even just that will open so many doors and send you well on your way, but most importantly because: romaji will not be there for you. At all. And to be able to learn to read efficiently you need to read! Just like when you first learned the alphabet you must try to read everything, try to read tweets, posts, articles from NHK news easy, candy packaging, anything! You don’t have to understand what you’re reading at all, you just have to be able to read it right. And learn this with all the sources I will list in the post don’t try to learn it completely in isolation. Some tofugu kana resources to get you started/supplement other resources: Hiragana guide, Katakana guide, kana charts

Getting started immediately with apps There’s lots of language apps to pick and try out but I think the 2 best options right away are Duolingo and Lingodeer. Duolingo has improved its japanese course so much since I first did it in 2017, finally more lessons so you can use it beyond the beginner stage, separate lessons for katakana finally, and it uses more kanji to really give you a headstart on that front! Its still kind of inefficient in isolation but its so good for getting you started. If you’re fine with spending some subscription money then Lingodeer, a recently paywalled app specially made for asian languages like Japanese, Chinese, and Korean is worth giving a try! Here’s a video review of it by Miku Real Japanese

Textbooks The most famous textbook used in classrooms is Genki! A good book, its concise, streamlined, and efficient! but it’s not really designed for you to study by yourself. Its designed for the classroom and doesn’t really include a lot of content to help you become fluent in reading kana and some kanji. This can make starting feel more daunting and overwhelming for some so a lot self learners myself included recommend starting with Japanese from Zero! Specially designed for self learners and does a slow and thorough approach with an incorporated workbook section! There’s lots more options to explore tho and cough cough pdf versions to check out before you have to settle with a purchase

Youtube  There are so many good youtube channels both old and new to help you at every step! If you need to hear someone explain things for you bc you want to practice listening/pronunciation, you just like lectures, written explanations didn’t help then youtube is a great asset! Japanese Ammo has lessons starting with absolute beginners, if you want to try your hand at doing lessons with no english at all, then Sambonjuku’s basics can help. Japanesepod101′s youtube is also a great place for beginners! This is just a tiny sample of the many youtube channels dedicated to teaching you japanese so if none of these clicked with you then there’s many more channels to try! All linked channels also have videos on kana! 

In summary simply getting started is the first step and when you conquer kana then that’s already big progress! These are the basic tools that helped me simply start so I hope at least one of them can be helpful, and if not then there must be some tool or resource out there that will work for you! And quick note: a book I’m reading right now that I also want to recommend as supplemental reading is Fluent Forever by Gabriel Wyner. Its really good advice on how to approach and start language learning and I agree with everything I’ve read so far, and its just a really encouraging book! I also recommend checking out Tofugu.com which has a lot of great reviews, articles, advice, and resource roundups for you to explore. also shoutout to my fav langblr on here @ohitoyoshi just because. and if anyone reading want to share what helped them get stared then feel free to add on!

Quelques mots similaires #8

Le monsieur = gentleman

La madame = madam, lady

La mademoiselle = miss

Les mesdemoiselles = ladies

Les messieurs = gentlemen

Les mesdames = ladies

cuire, faire cuire (au four)  to bake mélanger, remuer  to mix, stir tamiser  to sift lever  to prove, to rise (dough) préchauffer  to preheat

la levure  yeast le levure chimique  baking powder la levure de boulanger baker’s yeast le levain  sourdough starter le bicarbonate (de soude/sodium)  baking soda la sucre  sugar le sel  salt la pépite de chocolat  chocolate chip la farine  flour la farine complète  whole grain flour la pâte  dough la canelle  cinnamon  la (noix de) muscade  nutmeg

le pain au levain  sourdough bread le pain complet  whole grain bread le pain de seigle  rye bread le gâteau  cake le petit gâteau  cupcake, cookie la tourte  a savory pie la tarte  a sweet pie, tart, or torte le quatre-quarts  poundcake le biscuit  cookie le brownie  brownie le petit pain  roll, bun

Diary Writing in French

cher journal - dear diary

- you can talk about how your day was - this is a great opportunity to apply your knowledge of past tenses. 

How to say that you had a good day -

j’ai passé une très bonne journée

j’ai passé une excellente journée

j’ai passé une belle journée

j’ai eu une merveilleuse journée

j’ai passé une journée fantastique

How to say that you had a bad day -

Je n’ai pas eu une bonne journée

j’ai eu une journée affreuse - a really bad day

j’ai eu une mauvaise journée

j’ai passé une journée difficile 

How to say that you had a busy day - 

j’ai eu une journée des plus occupés

j’ai eu une journée chargée

la journée d’aujourd’hui s’est avérée fort occupée

How to say that you had a quiet/relaxing day - 

j’ai eu une journée tranquille

j’ai passé une journée tranquille

j’ai profité d’une journée de détente

Talking about time -

hier - yesterday

hier soir - last night

hier matin - yesterday morning

hier après-midi - yesterday afternoon

demain - tomorrow

demain matin - tomorrow morning

demain après-midi - tomorrow afternoon

demain soir - tomorrow evening

le lendemain - the next day

cette semaine - this week

la semaine dernière - last week

la semaine prochaine - next week

ce mois-ci - this month

le mois dernier - last month

le mois prochain - next month

cette année - this year

l’année dernière - last year

l’année prochaine - next year

when talking about a coming day e.g. next saturday = samedi prochain/le samedi suivant

To add a dash of drama -

et mon cul, c’est du poulet ? - yeah right!

faire du cinéma - to be a drama queen

j’ai du mal à croire que - I can’t believe that

jai vraiment foiré sur ce coup là - I really stuffed up!

je n’arrive pas à y croire ! - I can’t believe it

je n’en crois pas mes yeux - I can’t believe my eyes

je n’en reviens pas ! - I can’t believe it!

mon cul ! - my arse! (when you don’t believe someone, say if they’ve been lying to you)

Let me know if there is anything that you think I should add or if there are any corrections:)

French Resource List

Hopefully even if you've been learning French for a while one of these resources may be of use to you

General

French dictionary

Best online French-English dictionary (which also has bilingual dictionaries for a number of languages) as it has example sentences in French with translations, forum, verb conjugations, idioms, and more

RFI listening and reading exercises for all levels incorporating the news into your learning

Grammar

Français Lingolia with exercises

Listening

Journal en Français Facile radio/ podcast with transcripts for each episode

News in Slow French podcast

Conversational French Mises à Jour with transcripts

If you live in Australia, SBS has a French news podcast

French dictation exercises write what you hear

Youtube comedy series Bref

Belgian LGBTQ+ Youtube series La théorie du Y

Youtube comedy series Le Département

French comedy series that has whole episodes for free on Youtube Fais pas ci fais pas ça

Skam France is a teen show so you can learn heaps of slang, it also has subtitles for each episode in French and English

Youtube

Home Language - vocab and grammar

Hugo Décrypte - daily news

MisterJDay - comedy

Le Monde - news but many of their videos have subtitles

Reading

Simple articles originally written for children, also has a Youtube playlist (1jour 1actu)

Le Petit Scribe reading comprehension and exercises level B1 but also has the same for all levels

Reading (or listening) comprehension - Le Petit Nicolas

Writing

À vos plumes - writing practice and grammar

Oui c'est ça writing practice

Proofreading checklist

Other

Thoughtco French articles on grammar, vocab, verbs, etc.

French slang dictionary

French vowel pronunciation part 1 and part 2 with audio

More useful French pronunciation tips with audio and IPA

EDIT: just remembered in case you feel like torturing yourself you can do Victorian year 12 level French exams 2001 to 2020 for free on the VCE website with the audio and answers available. It would probably be more helpful to not do it within the time limit and listen to the audio as much as you need to. You might also find the HSC exam papers useful from what I can see there's three different levels of French exams (beginners, continuers, and advanced) just find them in the list of subjects and you'll get to the exams.

- take an ebook in your target language that you wanna read - convert epub to txt - copy txt into unique wordlist maker (http://caerphoto.com/uwc/) - remove words in the list you already know - maybe focus on keeping the high frequency new words - make this list into flashcard deck badda bing badda boom

I did this with my Turkish copy of Animal Farm and pulled 212 new words for my Quizlet deck

Vocab List/Grammar from My Blog Masterpost

if only i actually knew all these words

Keep reading

1/100. Monday, 08.03.20 — Français

Started a new notebook for my French study notes. Today was mostly a review for me. I struggle sometimes with remembering the grammar rules for French prepositions.

how does he produce full movies in three mins?? give him his oscar already